to be out, that the afghans will not be able to effectively counter what still remains a significant cal bontaliban and significantly discordant situation in both afghanistan and across the border in pakistan. so i think you probably are going to see an unraveling gradually. i think there's only one afghan brigade that is capable of acting independently. these forces need air support intelligence, all of the kind of logistics and other support that is necessary to be effective. fighting forces, they're not going to have that, and so i am much less an optimist about this eventual outcome. but when you look at the middle east, look at what happened at iraq, look at what happened in syria, the united states no longer leading from behind waiting from behind, and then you look at the decisions concerning afghanistan, you can understand why people throughout the region believe the united states is withdrawing and that is not good for the region. >> schieffer: let me ask you this senator. we went to afghanistan in the beginning because we wanted them to deny al-qaeda a safe haven the terrorists